


Moonshine

by ghoulaesthetics (astraielle)



Series: tumblr prompts [16]
Category: Mass Effect - All Media Types, Mass Effect Trilogy
Genre: F/F, First Dates, Fluff, Prompt Fic, Tumblr Prompt, yeela and selora are both dorks & i love them
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-03
Updated: 2017-11-03
Packaged: 2019-01-28 17:23:25
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,965
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12611596
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/astraielle/pseuds/ghoulaesthetics
Summary: “You can’t seriously be nervous about this.” From behind her, Selora’s roommate lounged on the bed. Lynia watched her paw through drawers and old shoeboxes for… Something. She wasn’t really sure why it was so important, either. “I mean, I don’t even know why you decided to go through with this–she’s a Quarian, Selora. Not exactly top-tier meat there.”





	Moonshine

**Author's Note:**

> matt wanted "Kiss on the forehead - Selora and Yeela <3" SO here u go mate

“You can’t seriously be nervous about this.” From behind her, Selora’s roommate lounged on the bed. Lynia watched her paw through drawers and old shoeboxes for… Something. She wasn’t really sure why it was so important, either. “I mean, I don’t even know why you decided to go through with this–she’s a Quarian, Selora. Not exactly top-tier meat there.” 

Miffed, Selora shut the drawer she was looking through with a little more force than she normally would. “It’s  _not_  about her… ‘meat’, Lynia,” she said coolly. “And I don’t care what she is–would you have the same look on your face if I was going out with a human?”

“Your back is facing me,” she pointed out. 

“Irrelevant,” she dismissed.  “I know what face you’re making. And it doesn’t matter. She’s smart. And funny. And cute.” 

“You haven’t seen under that helmet though,” she pointed out sourly. 

“It doesn’t matter,” she said firmly, watching herself in the mirror as she fastened a necklace around her neck. Not the one she’d been looking for, but it wouldn’t look good if she reopened the same drawer she’d just shut to make it seem like she had more conviction in her words than she actually did. It would have to do. “She’s cute on the inside. And that’s enough for me.”

“You probably could do better, you know,” Lynia said as she lazily flipped to another page in her magazine. 

“I’m not asking your sister out,” she rolled her eyes, checking the inside of her purse one last time to make sure she had everything she needed before she left the house. She turned around and faced her roommate. “So, final verdict before I go?”

“She’s into you though!”

“ _Lynia_.”

“Okay, okay,” she sighed. Looking up from her reading, she gave Selora the once over. “Not bad,” she said with a nod. “Nice dress. Could use a darker colour on the lips, though.” 

“You think?” She looked at herself over her shoulder in the vanity mirror. “This shade is already so much more… prominent than what I’m used to though.”

“Then leave it,” she shrugged. “It’s not like this girl doesn’t know what you look like. I mean, you did meet her the first time in your work clothes, right?” 

She chewed her bottom lip, remembering the fateful day–just last week, actually. She’d just finished her shift at the labs, sweaty and tired from a day of coding, translating, and then re-coding to address errors. So few people truly appreciated the intricacies that went into keeping the universal translators up and running smoothly. A difficult but necessary task, and one she loved. She ran into the Quarian in the hall just outside her offices, engaged in a heated debate over her comm. Selora picked up the words instantly, realizing that this woman had forgone the use of a translator for them–the Quarian dialect flew freely and fluidly off her tongue, and Selora found herself transfixed by the native parlance. It was rare that she got to hear such a thing on the Citadel, and against her better, more polite judgement, she hung around to listen and see how much she’d retained from her own studies. Surprisingly, she’d understood quite a bit. Not that the stranger’s conversation was any of her business. 

When she finally hung up, she flicked her translator back on, and without missing a beat or looking up, said to Selora, “You know, I’m pretty sure eavesdropping is considered taboo across the species–even if you can’t understand.” She was laughing, but Selora couldn’t tell if she was genuinely angry with her for loitering or not. 

“Oh! Uhm, that’s–you’re right, but see I  _could_  actually understand, so–” Mentally kicking herself for the admission, she sighed. “…Sorry. I–I should have just gone on my way and–”

“You understood that?” She said, obviously surprised. The blank-faced helmet cocked to the side, curious. “I didn’t think anyone bothered with that sort of thing these days–not with translators installed everywhere.”

“Ah!” She brightened considerably at the mention. “Well, that’s my job. I program them, make sure that they actually work–it’d be awfully hard to do if I couldn’t understand different tongues,” she said with a bashful sort of smile. “And, uh, I’m still really sorry about–you know. It’s rude.”

She waved her hand dismissively. “Don’t worry about it. It was just my mother–she’s worried that I won’t be able to find work here.” Selora could hear the eye rolling. “She’s been right so far but I’m not about to tell her that.” She laughed. “Your job sounds interesting though. Never really thought that there was anyone behind this tech.” 

“Most people don’t,” she admitted, “And if we’re doing our jobs correctly, they shouldn’t. It should be seamless, and accessible for everyone across the system. The things we do here–it’s all a part of a larger network.”

“So how many languages do you speak then?”

“Well, for most of us–I’d say the minimum we expect is probably fifteen? Of course, if you’re like me and you have a super long lifespan and you’re an overachiever, that number is a lot closer to… two hundred now? Not including dialects, of course, but I–”

“That’s _insane_ ,” she shook her head in disbelief. “How can you even…?”

“It’s fun!” She beamed, and then reigned herself in. “I mean, for me, anyway–I’ve always liked learning how people speak and communicate.”

“Passionate. I like that,” she said easily. “Yeela, by the way. Yeela’Faess Vas Moreh. No one bothers to get by the first name though.” She extended a gloved, three-fingered hand towards her.

The offer of a greeting made Selora’s heart jump in a way she hadn’t expected. “Ah, that’s–um, I’m Selora T’Vavo. ‘Doctor’ goes in front of that too, but most people don’t really remember that part.”

“That’s stupid,” she scoffed. “You worked hard for that title. Remind them of that, Dr T’Vavo.” 

“You–You’re right,” she said, eyes suddenly hyper-aware of the figure in front of her. The way Yeela was so casually leaned against the wall, the way she seemed so confident in what she was saying–Selora was positively transfixed. And she had to make sure she saw this woman again. They talked for the rest of the hour in that hallway, and by the end of it Selora had blurted out an invitation for lunch that weekend. It wasn’t her style to be so forward, but something told her that if she didn’t seize the moment, it’d be gone forever, and so would Yeela. 

Yeela accepted her invitation, to Selora’s shock, which lead her to the situation she was currently in. She left Lynia on the bed after her semi-helpful comments and made it down to the cafe in record time. She’d selected it special, keeping in mind the dextro-levo dietary needs they needed to adhere to. She’d heard good things about the place, and trusted that Yeela could find it. In true Selora fashion, she arrived half an hour early for their reservation. The table was already empty and waiting for them, and the hostess seated her almost right away. Nervously, she tapped her fingernails on the table as she scanned the room. 

Yeela wasn’t there yet. Perhaps she’d forgotten. Perhaps she’d changed her mind–she didn’t seem the type to just stand people up though, and they’d exchanged emails, so it’s not like she didn’t have a way to  _tell_ Selora she’d changed her mind in advance–

She left out an audible sigh of relief when she caught sight of the familiar sunset orange hood walk through thr doors. Yeela didn’t wait for the hostess to seat her, spotting Selora quickly. 

She rose to pull out the chair across from the one she was sitting in. Before she could stop herself, the words “You came!” had left her mouth, revealing a little too much relief with them. 

“And you’re here early,” she chuckled, graciously accepting the gesture. “I thought you might be, so I tried coming early too–still beat me though,” she said warmly. “Nice choice, by the way. I don’t really know what’s around here, but I wasn’t expecting something like this.”

“No?” She asked, flipping open the menu that’d been left at the place setting. “Why not?”

She shrugged. “Didn’t really take it as a Quarian-friendly area, that’s all. Doesn’t matter though–what do you recommend, Dr T’Vavo?” She asked earnestly, and Selora felt her face grow hot. Before she could answer, Yeela spoke up again. “Damn, I forgot–we aren’t ordering off the same side of things. Whoops,” she laughed, and the sound made the heat in Selora’s cheeks bloom into a full-on flush. 

This woman was  _dangerous_. She liked it. 

The waiter came by after they’d made their selections. Selora had settled on a salad, and Yeela had selected a soup for herself. “Emergency induction ports,” she explained before Selora could ask how she planned to tackle that one. “It’s a glorified straw. But don’t tell anyone I said that.” 

The lunch went by in a blur. Yeela made Selora laugh so hard she snorted, twice, and then laughed at her bewildered expression. Yeela revealed that while she was doing odd jobs for now in the tech field and occasional security work, she was actually a toxicologist by trade and had plans to make it into one of the forensics teams on the Citadel. She was also aware that this was not going to be easy. “But I like a challenge,” she told her, and Selora almost heard the wink.

She spent most of the time blushing and stammering. For someone who knew more words than everyone she knew, she sure wasn’t able to use most of them at the table that day. It didn’t matter, not really, because Yeela seemed pleased just to be there. She looked almost sad through the helmet when it came time to ask for the bill. 

“This was great, today,” she said cheerfully as they stood outside the cafe. “Really. I had an amazing time with you. We should do it again.”

Selora’s eyes widened. She nodded happily. “I’d really like that,” she said, beaming. “This was–you were–” Normally, at this point in the date, she’d be leaning in for a kiss on the cheek, or something equally quaint. But that wasn’t really an option here, with the helmet and all. The logic didn’t really stop her body from moving forward, though. Before she realized what she was doing, she was leaning down and pressing a kiss on top of Yeela’s helmet, right about where her forehead would be.

Yeela froze under her, apparently short-circuiting at the gesture. As soon as Selora realized what she’d done, she pulled back in a blind panic, hands raised in front of her. With a furious blush colouring her face, neck,  _and_  chest, she began to babble. 

“That was–I–Oh Goddess, I’m so sorry!! I just– _I have to go_!”  With that, she turned on her heel and marched stiffly down the hall, not quite believing what she’d just done. She was sure Yeela wasn’t upset with her, but Goddess help her, she was  _so_ embarrassed. Lynia was going to get a kick out of this one.

Before she could get further away, she turned back around and shouted, “I’ll call you! I’ll see you again!” With the conviction of someone making a life-changing decision. Yeela nodded dumbly at her, unable to form a real response. Selora nodded harshly once, still blue-purple, and then she was off into the crowd. 

Later, when Yeela looked at herself in a passing reflection, she wouldn’t be able to help notice the dark blue lipstick print left on her helmet. 


End file.
